Katara Week 2015
by vvdeh
Summary: One-shots following prompts for Katara Week 2015.
1. The Ice's Edge, And How They Live On It

**Katara Week 2015**

 **Disclaimer** : I do not own any of the characters depicted here. ATLA is the property of Viacom, Nickelodeon, and Bryke.

 **Prompt: Realizations**

 **Rating: T**

 **Summary** : Katara realizes the nature of her life in the Southern Water Tribe, and the price she has to pay for being a waterbender.

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"I was young when I learned

just how fragile life could be"

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When growing up in the Southern Water Tribe, one learns quickly about the nature of life.

How one single misstep on the ice can lead to a long, cold plummet.

How one moment an otter-penguin can be alive and squawking, and the next, crushed in the jaws of a polar bear dog.

How the tribe lived, and is living, on the edge of oblivion, balancing on the edge of a sheet of ice.

How every year, they teeter closer to the abyss, and no one says anything about it.

Katara understands it just as well as any child.

Watch where you step.

Watch what's around you.

Watch who's around you.

Keep your balance.

Hold on just tightly enough to the people balancing with you.

Know when to pull them back and let them go.

Know when to give them a push.

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But understanding is different from knowing, or realizing.

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Understanding is implied. It isn't obvious. It's a quiet and subtle kind of awareness, brought on by familiarity, by recognizing a part of your self in something or someone else. You may not even realize that you understand something, or someone. Understanding is something you _feel_.

She understands that there is danger beneath the ice, and if she slips through, she'll never come back.

She understands that there is something waiting in the tundra, looking for something smaller and weaker to eat, and that if Sokka hadn't rushed her away when he saw that something plodding towards them, it would have been her.

She understands that there's something much bigger out there in the sea. Something so terrible that it makes the adults' voices drop to whispers when they talk about it. Something that made the great Southern cities she's heard so much about vanish. Something that's surely kept the North away because _they have to know_. Something that makes babies with yellow eyes, straight black hair and pale skin. Something that somehow is related to the disappearance of children who are discovered holding fire in their hands.

She understands that her uncle Nukka isn't coming back from that hunting trip he and six other men set out on two weeks ago far faster than her brother does.

She understands that the tribe is delicate, and the only thing that is holding them together is each other. That they are all standing in a line on the edge of ice, holding hands, and they have to have a tight grip to stay on the edge, and know when to let go if they're dragging everyone down with them.

She understands the nature of life because she's seen it ever since she was a baby, but more so, because she has that same conflict within her. A constant balancing act, atop the edge of thin, thin ice. A different, sharper edge that somehow binds her to and isolates her from her tribemates. Lean too far in any direction and the abyss will draw you into itself.

She understands that the water is calling to her, and she longs to answer. But to do that is to jump off the edge.

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Knowing is much simpler. It's recognizing something much more concrete. Observations backed up by facts. It requires little intuition, and is much more black and white. You know something or you don't. (Sokka's better at knowing than she is, but she does her best.)

Katara knows that if she steps on the cracks, she'll probably fall in, and she knows that the water is cold enough to kill a child as small as her in minutes.

She knows that if she doesn't watch for predators like Sokka did, she'll end up like that otter-penguin that didn't pay enough attention.

She knows that the Fire Nation has been at war with the world for more than ninety years now. She knows that the something prowling on the seas is the Fire Nation. She knows that the last time they came was a year before she was born, and that when they come, black snow falls from the sky. She knows that the last time they came, children with yellow eyes were born soon after.

She knows that the illness that swept through the village three years ago is responsible for the sudden disappearance of all but four boys a few years older than her (Sokka's her brother, so he doesn't count). She knows that the other children are dead, and that only now are babies being born again, and toddlers waddling through the snow.

She knows that the tribe looks on the new children like miracles, and that they are why everyone keeps fighting. The new children haven't seen terrible things yet, they still smile and laugh and look forward to every day without knowing what's out there, they haven't learned about the balancing act, and _they must be protected_.

Katara knows that there haven't been waterbenders here for a long time. She knows that _no one can know about her_. She knows that _this has to be our secret, Katara_. _You can't show this to anyone, understand?_

She doesn't know why. Yet.

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Realizing is different altogether. It's a moment where everything clicks. Where the quietness of understanding has a hole torn into it suddenly and violently and you see it in a much harsher light. When there's no way you can deny it or look past it, and you have to see it in all it's ugliness.

She realizes that water is cold enough to kill, and ice is thin enough to break beneath you when her neighbor Ailik is brought home covered in furs head to toe, with only pale blue fingers slipping through. His mother, Nita simply nods solemnly when the men tell her that he was playing on ice far too thin to be safe. _If it's any consolation, he didn't suffer. For a boy small as him, it would've only taken a few minutes._

She realizes that the otter-penguin should have been careful. She realizes that she was _so close to that polar bear dog and didn't even see it, what were you thinking?_ She realizes that she can't go penguin sledding with Sokka anymore.

She realizes that the Fire Nation is evil. That they are the reason for the existance of the children with yellow eyes and pale skin and dark hair and fire in their hands that make their mothers' hearts break. That they are why the South hasn't spoken with anyone else in decades. They are what keeps her mother up on nights when the wind circles their igloo like a rabid wolfdog, staring at the flames, her eyes flickering to Katara now and then, like she's searching for something, and is terrified of finding it.

She realized she was a waterbender when she was six, when Sokka whacked her with a snowball (More snow than ice, but no one believes her) to the face and she retaliated by wailing and bringing a section of the igloo's roof down on his stupid head. The look on his face still brings a smug grin to her face.

She realized that being a waterbender was a bad thing that night, when Mom, Dad, Bato and Gran Gran huddled together and spoke with hushed, hurried voices, casting her terrified looks. She couldn't tell if they were scared for her or of her. When her brother frowned at them and refused to let go of her hand, and never strayed far from her during the few times she was allowed to leave the igloo after the incident, she realized that it wasn't her they were discussing.

She realized soon after that it could have been worse, when she and Mom are alone for several hours during a night when the wind howls. The moment Mom realizes everyone else is gone she crumbles. Mom sobs, cradling a concerned Katara close in trembling arms and whispers in a high, trembling voice, so quiet it could be mistaken for the wind outside: _Oh thank you! Oh thank you, La. Thank you for making her yours. If she'd been like..._

She realized that night, comforting her mother, that for all the bad she'd done, she'd at least been a waterbender. She could have held fire in her hands that afternoon. She has to hide now, but she doesn't have to disappear.

She realizes when she's eight, when the black snow ( _Not snow, Katara, soot_ ) falls and all those stories come rushing back, that they're here again. _I'm going to find Mom_.

She realizes when her mother says _, I'll give you the information you want_ , that they're looking for something.

She realizes what the Fire Nation were looking for that night, when the rest of the tribe learns what she is.

She realizes just how fragile life is when she bursts into the igloo after Dad, the scent of burning meat wafts into her nose, and sees her mother lying there.

She realizes how fragile it is as she sits quietly between Dad and Gran Gran, behind Sokka, shying away from the fire grinning maliciously at her from the center of Bato's igloo, and the harsh stares of the people packed in around her.

The rumors hiss and snarl like the wind that used to circle the igloo. Little things they'd noticed about her over the years. Spills, sudden sheets of ice, and most frequently, the roof incident. Suspicions about her mother, and the identity of her grandfather. ( _Oh_. She realizes what that means too.)

She listens to the tribe argue about her. The odds of spiriting her away across the world, of the raiders returning, of more yellow-eyed children suddenly appearing months from now ( _They came and went in less than an hour, but less than an hour's enough time, we need to check_ ), of being able to rebuild the wall before the storm hits.

Every few minutes, the verdict changes, and she's pushed and pulled over the abyss and back again.

 _Turn her over before they figure it out and come back._ Dead.

 _Send her to the North, she's their problem now._ Alive.

 _Send her out into the tundra and leave her_. Dead.

 _Send her to Kyoshi. That's far enough._ Alive _._

 _Give her to the sea, like the rest of them._ Dead. _Like the rest of them_.

She hears the whispers, feels their spearlike gazes, realizes that _waterbender_ is synonymous with _deathbringer,_ and realizes exactly what happened to the rest of them.

Her eyes flick over to a woman cradling a fussy baby across the fire, and realizes once more. They _must be protected_ at all costs. And because she's here, they're all in danger.

A harbinger of death cannot be trusted. But a daughter of the chief can.

She bows her head, and accepts whichever direction they decide to push her. Life is a fragile thing, easily persuaded one way or the other. If sending her over saves the tribe, and keeps their deadly balancing game from tilting as horribly as it has with her, she'll take that risk. If they decide to send her away, she'll go quietly.

If they decide to let her stay, she'll become the perfect example of a dutiful Water Tribe girl. She'll never waterbend again, and do everything her mother did twice as well, because the void now present in their family is there because of Katara, and she has to make it up to them somehow.

This is the price she'll pay for living in her mother's place, and she'll pay it a thousand times over. Because these children deserve to grow up in a world where there is hope, where there is no constant fear and no balancing act, where they won't have to spend time wondering about black snow and yellow eyes and _nine months from now_. These children don't know about the war yet, about waterbenders yet, about the terrible things they've done to survive, and the blood staining their hands.

They will someday, but for now, they will stay naive. And Katara will do her best to keep them that way.

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 **A/N:** So this is corresponding with Katara Week's prompts on tumblr (Check them out if you want). This is the first time I've done this kind of thing, and I'm not quite sure if all the prompts will be interconnected or just one-shots, but I will be following them according to the quotes that were posted alongside the prompts (I didn't have to, but figured, hey, why not?), to varying degrees of faithfulness to canon and the prompts (Seriously, I'm gonna go off into some crazy AU stuff at some point).

I feel like this definitely could have been written better, but I'm mostly satisfied with how it turned out.

This is pretty self-explanatory: It's Katara's childhood in the Southern Tribe, and plenty of my ideas about how the war affected the Tribe come through here. And it's also probably the only one that's going to be canon-compliant.

Review if you like. Questions and criticism are always welcome, and I'll respond to any questions related to this prompt in the AN, so if you ever decide to come back if you asked a question, check again.

Thank you for reading.


	2. War Paint

**Disclaimer** : ATLA is the property of Viacom, Nickelodeon and Bryke. I own nothing.

 **Prompt: Beauty/Power**

 **Rating: K**

 **Summary** : Katara finds herself drawn to the Kyoshi Warriors.

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"She moves a goddess, and she looks a queen."

-Alexander Pope, The Iliad of Homer (A poetic interpretation)

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Katara shifts in her hiding place, and leans forward, watching hungrily as the glinting metal fans catch the light of the setting sun and whirl with the sinuous movements of the warriors as they flow together like water. It's fluid, graceful and elegant, and their synchronization fascinates her, like the painted ladies all share a single mind.

Sokka calls it dancing, and he isn't wrong.

But her new friend Suki made sure to teach her that it's just as lethal as it is beautiful. Katara can imagine invisible enemies being warded off by their movements, blasts of fire being deflected by golden fans, soldiers being flung to the side by swift, powerful movements. When Suki teaches her some of the steps, she feels strong and fierce, like a true warrior.

Their fighting style was meant to turn their enemies' strengths against them, all about adaptation and versatility instead of brute strength and fearlessness (attacking first, they mean, because the fearlessness the Kyoshi Warriors show seems to be slipping by the tribesmen) that the Water Tribe has always praised as the heart of a warrior's skill.

When Gran Gran told her the philosophy is very similar to what she knows about waterbending, Katara became obsessed, and with her blessing, the Water Tribe girl's appearance at the windows every evening became an everyday occurrence.

Dad laughed it off at first, saying that she has work to do, that there'll be time for dancing when she's older, and looking for a husband.

( _Much, much older, Katara. Sixteen at the earliest_. _Please. Please._ _ **Please**_ _.)_

After Gran Gran scowled at Dad's comment and took him aside, Sokka seemed to find it extremely important to inform her that dancing with fans isn't going to attract any Water Tribe boys.

 _(Because you can't marry one of those Kyoshi wusses who let girls with fancy dresses and too much makeup boss them around. Seriously, 'tara, their dancing's terrible! No wonder they're so intense, they can't attract any_ _ **real**_ _men._ )

Katara scowled at this, and whacked Sokka with a spoon. Sokka seems to think that he should be emulating the Water Tribe men who feel that somehow, it's their spirits-given duty to inform the warriors about how their makeup isn't intimidating enough to be war paint, their kimonos are too girly to be uniforms, their fans aren't scary enough to be weapons.

Never mind that two years ago, their faces were enough to make grown men scream when the warriors leapt aboard the Tribe's ships when they first limped into the bay after three weeks of turbulent seas.

Never mind that their kimonos were fluid and allowed them to move like wind, slipping aboard without anyone knowing until nearly all of the warriors were incapacitated.

Never mind that their fans redirected every jabbing spear or swinging club, and caught every single warrior in less than five minutes, without a single drop of blood spilled.

Unlike the warriors, Katara refused to shrug and keep walking, and she didn't understand how they could do it. Some men (and brothers) need a good firm spoon-smacking once in a while, even if their minds don't change.

Dad returned, and awkwardly, with prodding and an icy glare from Gran Gran, begun lecturing to Katara about how important it was for Katara to interact with girls her age, like the ones who watched the 'dancers' practice, and doesn't she deserve a break?

(Katara finds it funny that Gran Gran's the one advocating for Katara to spend a few hours away from chores, but they're on Kyoshi Island now, and life isn't nearly as hard as it was down South, now that they're settling in and the last of the houses are being built. Some time away isn't going to harm anyone. And Gran Gran's expression when Dad explains to Katara why she's allowed to watch the warriors practice makes her think that there might be something else going on that she's not getting yet.)

So here she is, watching as the warriors bow to one another and take their separate paths out of the dojo, the training session over. After a moment of watching in reverent silence as the women disappear, Suki's fingers tap her shoulder, and the pair sprints off into the woods near the coast, away from the cloud of other girls who begin practicing under the watchful eyes of a young warrior who finds their daily observation amusing.

Suki thinks that they should be able to figure out the moves on their own before they show anything to a warrior. She's dead set on becoming one, and wants to be the best. Somehow, she thinks that the element of surprise will get her there. Katara's content to follow her, because Suki's usually right about things. And if Suki wants to practice with only one other girl, so be it. Katara's just pleased that the other girl is her.

Sokka laughs when he comes to grab Katara for dinner and discovers Katara and Suki practicing together in a small clearing next to the water, poking fun at their fans made of ferns and face paint improvised with mud. _The best we can get until I turn twelve, and I'm old enough to join next month_ , she tells Katara.

When Suki flips him over her shoulder with effortless grace, leaving his jaw flapping in the wind, Katara realizes exactly why the warriors don't bother correcting the Water Tribe men.

The dance, the face paint, the fans. They're all a clever, lovely illusion, one that confuses anyone who can't comprehend the idea that beauty and femininity can be dangerous.

Turn your enemy's strength against them. Take their narrow-minded, big-headed pride and shove it back in their faces, because it's their own fault if they can't recognize power when it's sitting right in front of them. Let them make fun of your face paint, your clothes, your preferred weapon, let them talk down to you because you're a girl and your fighting style looks like an elaborate dance. Let them refuse to take you seriously because warriors cannot be beautiful.

Because when the time comes to strike, they won't know what hit them.

Sokka pulls himself to his feet, bows to Suki, and to Katara's surprise, he says, _Show me more_.

He sits on a boulder to the side of their little fighting arena, watching with rapt interest as Katara runs through the forms she saw today, focusing on the flow of the energy through her body, and reaching out to the water a few feet away, feeling it recognize the movements of her body, and urging it to rise with her.

She can hear Sokka squeal, scrambling to duck behind the boulder, as a misshapen blob of water rises above the bay. He he remembers that all her other waterbending practices end with him either soaked or frozen in some way or another.

Instead of shivering, flying off to attack Sokka, or collapsing onto the ground, the water follows her, and she feels a smile split her face in two. _Push and pull_ , she thinks, _turn your enemy's strength against them._

It lengthens into a whiplike stream as she cycles through the forms, coiling as she spins and swooping with her as she moves, weaving through imaginary Fire Nation soldier attacks with quick sweeps of her arms and torso.

However, when Katara flicks her fern-fan, imagining it deflecting a fireball towards a tree to her right, the weight of the water at her side vanishes.

She blinks, and turns around, wondering if it somehow hit Sokka again, when she sees his flabbergasted gaze is fixed on a point just behind her. Suki has a massive grin on her face, and points with her fan.

Katara follows her gesture, and gasps when she sees it.

Embedded deep in the bark of the tree, in the exact shape of her fan slice, is a line of slender ice daggers, each about as long as her forearm.

Katara feels a rush of excitement as she, Suki and her brother rush over and begin inspecting the projectiles, chattering excitedly as power hums in her ears and she feels as though something deep inside her has suddenly clicked into place.

Sokka, after examining them, looks over at her when he watches Dad and the men don their war paint, and insists that she do it again, before he whispers something to Suki and races away down the path towards their settlement.

When Katara asks what he's doing, Suki shrugs and says, _Forget him. Let's see if you can do that again. Start with the basic set, and I'll help you along._

Katara gets into her stance, calls to the water, and begins again.

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When Katara finally drops to her knees in the now-muddy clearing, gasping for breath with her hair loopies sticking to her sweaty forehead, she looks up at Suki and realizes with a start that an audience has grown.

Behind Suki, on a log near the path are several girls she recognizes as being fellow observers (Although she feels guilty for knowing only one of their names). They want to be warriors too, and they seem beside themselves with excitement, and burst into applause when they realize she's looking at them. Behind them, leaning casually against a tree is the warrior who was offering pointers on the young girls' techniques from earlier, and her painted mouth is coiled into a half-smile that makes Katara quiver with excitement. In her fingers, she turns an ice splinter.

Katara giggles and waves, feeling her chest swell, and turns to the boulder, where she sees Sokka has returned, and Dad and Bato are crouching behind him, staring at her in thinly-veiled awe. Gran Gran stands nearby, with a light in her eyes that Katara's never seen before.

Suki pulls her to her feet and bows before Katara, announcing that she's a worthy opponent and simply _must_ join the warriors with her. She glances quickly over at Katara's family, and then backs away suddenly as they join her, retreating with the other girls back up the path. The warrior doesn't leave yet.

As her family engulfs her, they shower her with praise about her movements. Sokka's thrilled that for once, she didn't soak him, and thinks she might finally be controlling her 'magic.' Bato admits that he's never seen anything like it, and he wants to know if that's all she can do. Gran Gran is convinced that the warriors are leaving a good impact on her, and wants her to continue learning from them as much as she can, since the likelihood of getting her to the North Pole is slim to none.

Katara beams at this, and begins rubbing her ruined war paint off, since it's runny from all the sweat and water and Gran Gran won't want her parading around with mud caked on her lips and eyelids. Better to get rid of it now than to face Gran Gran's wrath with a rag when they get back to the tribe.

He raises an eyebrow at this and asks her what it's supposed to be. _War paint, Dad!_

He nods, and says nothing else as they begin walking back, just glances over his shoulder at the clearing where Suki and Katara's battle took place.

Gran Gran begins talking about waterbenders for the first time in months. However instead of discussing the raids, she tells elaborate tales about the feats her friends and relatives could accomplish with their waterbending, about the flowing forms that made water whirl with them. In an instant, they would turn from beautiful to deadly. _Some could even channel their waterbending through their weapons_ , Gran Gran says as she reaches down and taps Katara's fern-fans.

Katara frowns as she tries to straighten her fans, now soaked, drooping and missing many leaves. Those that still clung stubbornly to the stalks were faded and brittle. It had taken her and Suki the better part of an hour to get them to look right, and now they're destroyed. She longs to use that amazing string of curse words Bato unleashed yesterday when he saw that Sokka had somehow gotten two fish hooks stuck in his thumb, but knows better.

Sokka and Bato immediately begin fantasizing about ice spears and guiding water slices with swords, but it quickly gives way to a passionate argument about whether Katara could beat up the unagi. Sokka's confident that she can, even though she isn't a master of the boomerang like he is, but Bato seems to have some doubts. (Who knows, maybe she _will_ beat up the unagi just to see the look on his face)

She doesn't notice that her father disappears for a few minutes when he sees a familiar painted face in the distance.

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That night, when dinner is finished and Katara is helping Gran Gran clean up, her father approaches her.

 _You know, I hear the Kyoshi Warriors' face paint is waterproof..._

 _I think you'd look beautiful in it,_ Gran Gran adds. _It's much better than that mud you keep rubbing on your face_.

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 **A/N:** So... this one is not as dark as the previous prompt, but I'm really pleased with it.

And yeah, it looks like I'll be doing all these as one-shots. So they're not connected in any way to each other.

This is basically an AU where, instead of remaining in the South Pole, the Tribe flees to Kyoshi Island a few months after the Southern Raiders attack.

I noticed that the Kyoshi Warriors' philosophy about turning your enemy's offense into your defense fits really well with waterbending, and decided to run from there.

Thanks for reading!


	3. Something Good Will Come Of This

**Disclaimer** : I do not own any aspect of ATLA. They are the property of Nickelodeon, Viacom and Bryke.

 **Prompt** : Determination/Strength

 **Rating: T**

 **Summary** : Katara masters bloodbending.

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"Becoming fearless isn't the point. That's impossible. It's learning how to control your fear, and how to be free from it."

-Veronica Roth, _Divergent_

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She couldn't forget.

The control she'd felt, curling her fingers and overriding everything Hama was, making her bow.

The sensation of being inside Hama's, feeling every part of her from the inside, knowing _exactly_ how she worked.

(The eerie calmness she felt when she seized control. There was no horror at what she'd done in the moment. She was as calm as death.)

The knowledge that if she had made a single mistake, she would have done horrific damage to Hama's body.

The tragic and monstrous legacy the Southern Tribe's waterbenders had left behind, and how sad it is that all this knowledge has been perverted and transformed into something hideous by the war.

She lay awake that night, staring at the moon, wondering what would happen if she were to use it again.

Would she gesture to Aang or Toph or Sokka one day, and realize that she's twisting their insides?

Or would she reach out intentionally to someone and make them dance the way Hama played with her?

What if she hurt someone?

What if she killed someone?

What if she _liked it?_

That morning, Katara awoke terrified of her own power, and forced herself to waterbend for the simplest of tasks like cooking and the laundry, if only because she knew Aang, Toph or Sokka would see, and get worried.

And she couldn't have that, not with the war to think about. She is the thing that binds them all together, and if they see that their foundation is unsteady, they will crumble quickly, and scatter like ash.

She couldn't let them see she was afraid. She couldn't run the risk of losing control.

So clearly, the only thing she _can_ do is take this strange and terrible power and conquer it.

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In the shadows of the Western Air Temple, she rises every night and wanders to a distant corner of the ruins, far from where the rest of her friends (And Zuko) sleep, but just close enough to be able to defend them if there's an attack.

She has to now. There's no way to avoid it, like she has before. That treacherous viper-rat has his nest right down the hall from her and she can't know when he's going to strike. The last time she let her guard down around him, the world fell apart, so she has to be ready this time.

It makes her skin crawl, knowing she's too far to be the first to respond when he attacks, but these experiments could go wrong at any moment, and she can't risk harmingsomeone by mistake.

Every night, she stares at the moon, and lets her senses explore, finding mice and feeling the blood running beneath their skins, becoming as familiar with them as she is with her own body.

At first, she only manages it for a few minutes before she breaks down sobbing, and begins scratching at her skin, feeling so horribly _dirty_.

Then, she reminds herself, _it's for them, Katara, it's for them_ , and suddenly the disgust is bearable. She can be a monster. She can live with that if it means that they're safe. They don't need to know about this. She can handle the shocked looks and inquiries after she's saved them. Zuko can't know, until she has to use it on him (As much as it shames her, she almost looks forward to the day she has to, if only to see the look on his face, when the little peasant twists his limbs around like he's one of Hama's puppets).

There's a war going on out there, and Hama is one of it's children. This technique was developed in hell by a woman in anguish, made purely for survival, that somehow got tainted with a desire for vengeance along the way. Katara is a daughter of war as well, and she understands completely. If they're going to survive, this is something she has to learn to do. She can deal with the madness later, but for now, she will keep her family safe.

She dries her tears, and continues exploring.

When the moon begins growing in size, she reaches out and grasp their blood, and stops one dead in it's tracks, without a second thought about the morality of her actions.

At first it was just the one mouse.

Then two, then four.

Then, she had an entire swarm of them at her command by the fifth night, when she realizes that though the moon is no longer full, she can still find their blood easily.

She holds them in place for minutes at first, then hours.

Then, on the twelfth night, she holds them in her grip until the sun begins rising and she has to return to the others to make breakfast, shaking off her fatigue like it's as harmless as dust.

On the thirteenth, she makes the mice dance for her, and hears herself laughing at how strange it looks.

On the fourteenth, she makes them follow her in a neat line as she wanders through the temple, like ducklings following their mother. Across the temple, all the way back to the row of rooms where her friends are sleeping, down the hall to make sure that Zuko hasn't returned without Sokka (They're still gone, spirits, _where are they_?), and back again.

On the fifteenth, she realizes that she can stop their hearts as easily as she can stop their limbs, and she begins thinking about using this application in the field. A heart attack seems much more painless than being slashed with ice daggers or Sokka's sword, or being smashed by a pillar of stone. It's a merciful kind of death, though it's far more calculated and requires much more willpower than frantically sending an ice blade towards a Fire Nation soldier and not focusing on what's left behind when she hits her target

 _But mice might not be enough_ , she thinks on the sixteenth as she bites her lip. If Zuko turns on them (and he _will_ turn on them, despite how strangely _nice_ he's being to everyone; she's fallen for that before and watched Aang die, _and that will never happen again_.) she'll need to defend her friends, and Zuko knows all of her tricks.

All but this one.

But if she reaches for his blood and cannot grasp it, cannot halt his attack in midair, cannot make him run himself off the temple into the gorge below, cannot make his heart stop, what good is this?

If this was all for nothing, how is she going to face her brother and her friends when they see her doing this?

She shudders, shakes the thought off, and focuses again.

Katara decides not to wonder about when she stopped fearing her power, and started fearing her friends. Because when she's mastered this (And _she will master this_ ), when she has to use it on someone trying to hurt them, she's going to have to face them next.

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When she tells Zuko about her mother, and she sees the full moon staring back at her, she knows that she's strong enough.

She knows she'll have the control necessary to do this, and she knows without a doubt with the moon on her side, she'll have more than enough power to bend a grown man to her will. Even if she messes up and leaves him horrifically wounded, he'll deserve it. It's the _least_ she could do.

She knows that this is something she's been dreaming about for a very long time.

When she curls her fingers and feels the _monster_ bow to her, she feels a rush of glee.

When she lifts his head and makes him look at her, she wonders if this cold satisfaction is what Hama felt when she started down that terrible path.

When she looks into his eyes and realizes that _it's not him_ , she feels her heart freeze and the disgusting filthy feeling she hasn't had in weeks comes rushing back. Her bloodlust is replaced with uncertainty and revulsion, and she wishes she'd never discovered this power.

 _Monstermonstermonstermonstermonster_ whispers in her ears that night, and she braces herself for Zuko to say it, but he never does. He never discusses it with her, and never looks at her differently. It confuses and relieves her in equal measure.

For the rest of their search, she cannot bring herself to reach into anyone's blood and make it obey her.

For the rest of their search, she waits for Zuko's inevitable question or comment, but it never comes. He never looks at her differently, and she's relieved that she hasn't destroyed the strange understanding they've forged over the past few days.

When they return, she waits for Zuko to tell Aang and Sokka what she's done.

She sits on the edge of the pier, toes dangling inches above the water, thinking about her decision, about how similar she and Hama are after all, about how this might be the last time Aang will ever look her in the eye again because he has to know now, and when he calls her name she tenses, thinking, _this is it_.

But it never comes. He hasn't told. Her secret is safe.

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Zuko's life is slipping out of her hands, and no matter how hard she tries she can't make the charred edges of the hole meet fast enough.

Despair clouds her vision, and rakes at her mind with razor-sharp talons as she realizes with a start that _his heart has stopped_.

But within the despair is clarity, just like it came to her after Appa was taken and they were stranded in the desert.

 _His heart has stopped._

(You can't hurt him any worse than this.)

You can stop a man's heart, _who says you can't restart it_?

So she reaches out, feeling the blood beneath his skin, the horrible charred hole in his chest, and follows the pathways through his body. For the first time, she bends the blood of a friend.

( _Push and pull_.)

She guides the blood back and forth, and when it passes through his heart, she gently squeezes.

Once.

Twice.

Three times.

And he gasps, his whole body shuddering as her hand releases his heart, and it begins beating on it's own again.

She stares down at him, tears streaming down her face, exhaustion clouding her mind, and when he thanks her, she realizes that this power might be useful for so much more than taking lives.

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Two months after the end of the war, Katara has it figured out.

Of course she's going to return to the North Pole, and become a master healer. Of course she's going back to the South to help rebuild. Of course she's going to teach waterbenders someday.

But right now, she's in a position to do something that's never been done before, and if she's right, this could change everything.

She's going to explore the potential of bloodbending as a specialized healing practice, by integrating it into Northern healing techniques.

She's going to take the South's legacy, forged in hatred and rage and fear in the darkest hours of the war, into something they can take pride in. This is something that will save countless lives and help heal the scars of this broken, flawed world the war has left in it's wake.

There is a place for this power (And a place for her as well) in peacetime, and Katara's making it her mission to find it.

When she tells Toph, the earthbender nods casually and seems eager to see what Katara will find. When she says that she's never been all that phased by the idea of bloodbending, Katara has her explain.

 _Bloodbending is an extension of waterbending, just like metalbending is an extension of earthbending. Saying that one's natural and the other isn't is just kinda weird._ _Metal's been used to build stuff, and the battle on the day of the comet was won partly because I'm the best metalbender in the world, but if some jerk like Long Feng could metalbend, wouldn't he use it to hurt the people in Ba Sing Se? Shouldn't we ban metalbending too?_

Zuko is in full support of her decision. _It's more to do with the bender than the type of bending itself_ _._ _Just look at the Fire Nation._ _Terrible people like Ozai used firebending to wage war, and Aang was only able to learn firebending once he realized that it's not inherently evil (_ Master Jeong Jeong seems to need to learn this as well, if she can recall correctly) _. It's just how the power is wielded._

 _Look, if anyone can make this work, it's you,_ Suki says when Katara tells her. _I trust your judgment._

But Aang and Sokka? She doesn't know, and the possibilities are making her head spin as she stands in front of them, listening to their own plans for the next few months, waiting anxiously for her turn.

She can see the most likely outcome clearly: Aang with concern in his eyes, reaching to her tentatively, like she's made of glass, and Sokka gaping at her with those buggy eyes and his jaw dropping.

She'll definitely need to sit through a hurried one-sided discussion about how evil and violating and unnatural bloodbending is, how it should never be practiced again, that ends with Aang and Sokka waiting for her to promise to never bloodbend again.

But she's rehearsed this conversation over and over, and she knows that it's also entirely possible that they'll listen to her, and show some interest in her ideas.

When Aang has finally figured out a route to the most secluded mountaintops in the Earth Kingdom, where a few enclaves of airbender refugees might still be hiding out, they turn to her.

Katara feels her hands shaking but her voice is clear.

After all, she's mastered bloodbending. She's discovered a use for it in a world without war. She knows she can do this.

There's so much potential here that she can see, and as she tells them, she _knows_ they're going to understand.

* * *

 **A/N** : Long story short, I have issues with how bloodbending was treated in A:TLA and LOK. I honestly feel that Katara would have done something with it, and that it was criminalized without any real thoughts on it's potential to do good.

I honestly have a few issues with how this turned out, but I feel like, fuck it, this is as good as it's gonna get.

I'm also realizing that the prompts and quotes only end up having a vague similarity to what I end up writing. Oh well.

Thank you for reading.


	4. The Moon Calls Her Sister

**Disclaimer** : I do not own any aspect of ATLA. They are the property of Nickelodeon, Viacom and Bryke.

 **Prompt** : Selflessness

 **Rating** : **T**

 **Summary** : The Siege of the North goes differently.

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"No! I will never, ever turn my back on people who need me."

-Katara, _The Painted Lady_ (S3E3)

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They're gone.

And she can't think.

People are screaming, she figures. Maybe she is.

She should be, since it feels like her heart's been punched out of her chest. Her head swims before her and she feels so horribly _empty_.

Dimly, she recognizes that the water isn't calling to her anymore. She can't feel it at all.

Fire blooms in front of her, and she should be diving backwards to avoid it. She should be screaming as the too-familiar scent of roasted flesh permeates the air, and the Fire Nation soldiers drop to the grass, cooking in their own armor.

She should care that the man who killed the moon and the ocean was struck down by one of his own.

She should be grabbing Sokka's boomerang and lunging across the oasis at him, crying for his blood, because he's a firebender.

But she's rooted in place, staring numbly at the hollow indentation in the middle of the oasis, where there should be water but isn't, using the dim light the stars provide because there's a hole in the sky where the moon should be.

Nothing matters now. There is no hope. There is no future. There's no moon to guide her waterbending, no water to bend.

The rest of the Fire Nation will come soon enough, melt the great city to the ground and destroy the oasis in an inferno, and she can't bring herself to cry or scream or feel anything at all.

In the back of her mind, she feels responsible. If she had beaten Zuko, if he hadn't taken Aang, if Aang's body were here hours ago, they could have stopped this.

This is her fault.

And she has to do _something_.

Somehow, dimly, in the back of her mind, she knows that Yue feels this too.

As Aang and the old man (what's his name, Iroh?) gently step into the oasis ( _How dare you_ , she suddenly wants to scream at him. _How dare you step in here after everything your people have done_!) and scoop the limp, charred bodies of Tui and La off the bone-dry ground, she hears the princess whisper, _There is no hope now_. _It's over_.

Dully, she registers Aang saying something before rushing off, but that doesn't seem to matter now. Nothing does. Nothing besides Tui and La and they're gone and it's all her fault.

Katara steps forward, closer, and watches Iroh lay Tui on the ground tenderly beside La, staring at the dead spirit as if he's lost a part of himself too, as if he's still checking for signs of life.

 _It's too late_ , she hears herself speak as she hangs her head, _they're dead_.

( _Of course they are, what are you, an idiot?)_

She stares at the ocean's limp form, studying the dark, burned scales that were so mesmerizing just a few hours ago, that seemed so familiar. She'd seen this before, she'd known exactly who this was even before Aang revealed the identities of the moon and the ocean to her, Yue and Sokka on their hectic ride back to the oasis.

She could never bring words to it until he had told her, but she had always known. Tui and La, push and pull, yin and yang, darkness and light, moon and ocean. Of course that was who they were.

Iroh's voice breaks her trance. _You have been touched by the moon spirit. Some of it's life is in_ _ **you**_ _._

( _ **Her**_ _life_ , Katara corrects him automatically, though she doesn't know where the distinction came from, or why it matters in the slightest. It feels important nonetheless.)

She doesn't need to lift her head to know he's talking to Yue, and she isn't shocked in the slightest that she knows exactly what he means.

(But what does it matter if part of it is in her? The moon and the ocean are a pair, and he's only talking about the moon. Suppose the moon does return, she won't last long without her partner.)

 _Yes, you're right. It gave me life. Maybe I can give it back._

(But a fish cannot live without water, and there's no way that her sacrifice will mean anything without the ocean rejoining her.)

 _Oh_. She raises her head, eyes widening. She sees now.

As Sokka's voice shudders, as he begs Yue not to give herself up, Iroh looks at her closely, and seems to know what she's thinking. He asks her quietly, _do you think it would work_?

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She would have to be Yue's equal for this to happen. They'd have to have just enough in common, and just enough different to compliment each other properly.

The more she thinks, the more she realizes that yes, they fit each other well.

She's the closest thing the South has to a princess, and that would make her Yue's equal socially (For what little it matters).

She's from the South Pole, and used to struggle and strife where Yue, a Northerner understands splendor and special treatment.

Katara, the last Southern waterbender, can both heal and fight with water, and can more than make up for Yue's lack of bending abilities.

They're both similar of age, from both Tribes, both bound by duty and determined to do whatever it takes to save their people.

One is bound by tradition, the other is determined to destroy it.

One has never left the Tribe, the other has traveled the world. (And if she doesn't make this choice, she'll likely keep traveling for the rest of her life, but she can't afford to think like that, so she shoves the thought away.)

Yue was saved by the moon, and Katara saved the Avatar.

Yue is merciful, diplomatic and kind, and could easily be cold, distant and aloof. Katara is calm, generous and supportive, but she has always known that she has the capacity to be ruthless, unforgiving and terrifying.

Together, they could be an ideal partnership, each making up for the other's weaknesses, and keeping one another in check.

Everything she's seeing here has to mean something. The fact that they're here together, despite everything that could have happened to prevent this moment, only seems like fate itself is in support of this choice.

Yes, this could work quite easily. They'd make a good team, if only they knew each other better, but if what Katara is considering happens, then they'd have all of time to become familiar.

But would the Ocean spirit accept her as his successor?

They're certainly similar enough.

Katara, as much as she is kind and genuine in her desire to help everyone, can be wild and dangerous and utterly merciless. There's a rage there, and a passion, just beneath the surface, that's been itching to come out, a power that's long been denied.

As much as people think they know her, they have no idea about what she's really thinking, about the darkness at the core of her being, the secrets that will die with her about the tribe's survival during the war, and the humanity they've had to give up along the way.

Like the ocean, she is only as kind and gentle as she chooses to be, and maybe it's time that the whole world knows it. Maybe it's time that she stops being calm and inviting, and begins being furious and tempestuous.

As the ocean, she can bring the monsters in her depths to the surface at last. She can keep her people safe with a ruthlessness that she's always had, without fear of repercussion.

As the ocean, she doesn't have to restrain her wrath.

As the ocean, no one will dare disrespect her or downplay her importance, and no one will ever try to write her off as _just some girl_ again.

As the ocean, she can work with Yue (and if he's able to reach them, Aang) and keep the Tribes- no, not just the tribes, the _world_ safe.

Yes, she can carry the ocean's mantle.

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When she looks at Iroh again, she nods confidently, and catches Yue's eye.

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 _It's my duty, Sokka._

Would it be easier not to tell him? He'd try to stop her. She'd have to do it now, while Sokka's trying to stop Yue.

 _I won't let you! Your father told me to protect you!_

No. She has to. He has to know that she's doing this. His heart will break either way. He'll think he's failed his promise to Dad, and likely never forgive himself, but at least he'll know. If she leaves without saying a word, he'll always be full of uncertainty and doubt, like how they felt when Dad sailed off to war years ago and left them wondering if he'll be safe, if he's hurt, if he's been dead for months and news hadn't reached them yet. And she can't do that to him.

 _I have to do this._ Yue's hand slips from his grip, and she reaches out to the moon in Iroh's arms, places both hands onto it delicately, and a rush of power overwhelms Katara, filling the insides of her eyelids with blinding white light.

 _No_! Sokka cries, and Katara opens her eyes to see Yue's limp body cradled in Sokka's arms. He whispers, _she's gone, she's_ _ **gone**_ , and holds her close.

But nothing happens. The moon does not return, and though it's wounds are healed, the fish stays still.

Yue is waiting, she realizes. _For me_.

Katara scoops up the moon spirit gently, and slips into the hollow shell of the oasis, placing it gently in her lap.

Sokka turns, and gapes when he sees her.

 _Katara_ , he begins, his voice quivering, eyes full of tears, a hand reaching out to her. _Katara, **no**._

 _Sokka, this is something I have to do_. She sets the moon down gently in Iroh's hands, and reaches for the ocean spirit, removing her gloves. Sokka releases Yue and dives for the fish, snatching it and grabbing her hand.

 _Katara, no_. _You **can't**_.

The tremor in his voice and the pain in his eyes makes her hesitate.

 _Can_ she do this? Can she really leave Sokka alone, when Mom's dead, Gran Gran's on the other side of the world, and Dad is somewhere they don't know?

Can she leave Aang too? She's come to really care about him in the months that they've been traveling together, and she knows he'll be heartbroken.

And she really doesn't want to die. Because whether she says it or not, that's what she's doing by taking this choice.

(She wonders if the train of thought is similar to that of her mother's in her last moments)

There's so much she wants to learn and do. The world is so big and she wants to see it all.

But she also wants this war to end.

And she will never turn her back on people who need her.

 _This is the only way, Sokka. Please, let me go. I'm doing this for everyone._

He stares at her for what seems like forever, before a shuddering sob escapes his throat and he releases her hand.

Sokka sets the fish down for a moment, and leans in, embracing her gently. She feels tears begin to run down her face, and she trembles, because this might be the last time she'll ever see him again, or touch him, and she feels a leaden weight settle in her chest because she's never known a life without Sokka. He's always been there, and where she's going, she'll be separate from him forever. If she even remembers who he is, and can even interact with him, it'll never be the same.

But this has to happen.

She steels herself, and gently disentangles herself from his embrace. There's one more thing.

She reaches up behind her neck, and fumbles for a moment before she finds the clasp.

Katara gently unties her mother's necklace and removes it, stroking the well-worn carving before she reaches for Sokka's hand.

Katara opens it, places the necklace into his palm, and closes his fingers around it.

She doesn't let go of his hand yet as she reaches for the ocean, now cradled in one of his arms. Gently, she plants her free hand on the fish's marred scales.

Katara feels the tugging deep in her spirit, urging her to leave behind her body and become something new, something dark and powerful.

It's so much _easier_ than she could have imagined. But she's done this so often that she should be used to it by now. Katara is used to giving everything she has to everyone she meets, from Aang and Sokka and her village to complete strangers they meet for only a few minutes on their travels.

She's sacrificed her childhood to keep her family together. She's sacrificed precious time she could spend waterbending to keep her village running. She's sacrificed her home to help Aang save the world.

She's known ever since their arrival at the North, when she dared to dream about a life after the war is over, that she'll sacrifice much more than that in the years to come, in order to help her tribe recover.

It's only natural that Katara will sacrifice her life to save her people.

She closes her eyes and lets the darkness consume her.

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They circle each other, in water that only moments ago was gone completely, around the fading corpse of a girl who collapsed into the oasis only moments ago, her grip on her brother's hand finally released by oblivion.

The two get accustomed to one another, to the new dance they will be sharing, before they turn, remembering the boy they care deeply for. He's staring with wide, teary eyes down at them as his sister's body turns to water and vanishes into the oasis, much like how the girl who is laid out beside him has faded into moonlight.

For a moment, they pause, and agree immediately on who should greet him first.

The ocean spirit vanishes into the dark depths of the pool, and the water of the spirit oasis glows a deep, ominous blue, before rising, crawling up the walls and gathering all the fountains, canals and waterways in the city, forming a monstrous body that slithers over buildings, inspiring terror and awe in the hearts of all who see her.

There's work to be done.

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Yue rises, transparent and cloaked in silvery moonbeams, glowing softly and sweetly. She is lighter than air, hovering over the oasis, and smiles at him benevolently.

 _Goodbye Sokka, I will always be with you_ , she says, planting a kiss on his lips before fading into soft, soothing light.

As the moon flashes back into being, bathing the ice below in light, a thousand waterbenders simultaneously look up into her face, feeling that something fundamental has shifted within them. The call of the water has returned, but it's different somehow.

But they are waterbenders. Adaptation is natural to them.

And the monster that crawls through their city towards the outer wall is on their side.

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The leviathan slithers on through the streets, her fins flickering as she passes rows of deserted houses, shops and streets.

For a moment, she pauses, and turns her gaze to the battered prince gaping at her, alone on a bridge overlooking a canal. Looking for the Avatar? Or just running away?

She leans closer and closer, delighting in his dumbstruck expression and the way he drops to his knees and flattens himself against the railing.

She wonders if he knows who she is. There's something in those bright yellow eyes that recognizes her, though he doesn't seem to realize exactly from where. If he looks close enough, maybe he can see her wreathed in shadow in the heart of her monster's body.

How easy it would be, she reflects as she inches closer and closer, until only a thin skin of water separates them, to just swallow him up right now.

She lets her face slip out of her monster's watery jaws, and is close enough to brush noses with the prince. Of all the things she could do, she finally settles on a smile (Just the right kind, a mix of mysterious, wry and amused that she's sure will be burned into his brain for the rest of his life), a cock of the head, and a raised eyebrow. _Yeah_ , she thinks, _I didn't expect things to turn out this way either, Prince Hotpants._

The stuttering gasp he responds with when he finally seems to recognize her is music to her ears.

 _Who's the peasant now_? she decides she wants to say. ( _I'll save you from the pirates_ is a close second)

She's about to speak when she notices Iroh has appeared, huffing and gasping with a bright red face, leaning against a building. He meets her eyes and his ruddy complexion turns white as the ice around them. He shuffles towards her with the exhaustion of one who's run around the earth without pause, but also with the grim determination that she's observed many times in the boy who trembles before her. Iroh limps to stand between them, and she smiles fondly at him.

They regard each other for a long moment as the sound of battle echoes through the icy streets, seemingly so distant even though she knows they're seconds away.

She owes this man greatly. He killed the monster who destroyed their predecessors, and allowed them to be reborn. And she sees a profound humanity in him that draws her to him like a butterfly-moth to a lamp light.

The leviathan flicks her fins and pours herself back into the canal, whipping through the city and dragging a trail of drowned firebenders in her wake, their armor clanking as they bump against one another. She's been delayed long enough, and there's a war to win.

She will repay the old man twice, she decides. For destroying the monsters who killed Tui and La, she will spare the boy he loves enough to stand in the way of a god. For allowing herself and Yue to replace them, she will aid them later in their escape.

Even though she can't see it, she can feel Yue smiling at her.

As her partner gives the waterbenders strength, she leaps over the ice wall with the force of a tsunami, screaming razor winds and spitting splintered hail.

She tries not to look at the boy standing on the wall behind her, watching her devastate the fleet with all the graceful malice and tranquil fury of a hurricane.

But every once in a while, she catches him in the corner of her eye, and sees that he is crying.

She wonders if she should reach out to him, but stifles the impulse. He'll seek her out when he's ready, when his grief-stricken mind can make sense of what she's become.

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The ocean comes to him when it's all over and the tip of the sun is just brushing the horizon, coloring the ice a soft pinkish orange.

She slips up from the oasis quietly with darkness clinging to her form, water streaming down from her loose, wild hair and clinging to her hair loopies.

He's sitting with his back against one side of the spirit gate, his eyes red and swollen, breathing softly with little gasps, tracing the pattern of the necklace in his hands over and over.

She smiles sadly at the boy who was once (No, _still is_ ) her brother.

He glances up for a moment, and sees her. He draws himself shakily to his feet, and collapses into her arms once more.

They hold each other and speak quietly for a long time, before she feels Yue call her back. She has one more debt to pay and he has a tribe to help rebuild.

Before she goes, she promises to meet him again.

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She resurfaces in the frigid waters lapping along the coast of the outer edges of the North Pole, where Iroh is struggling to send his raft away, while the prince lays exhausted next to him, staring with half-closed eyes at the horizon.

In theory, she doesn't have to help them at all. She can consider her debt repaid by not guiding a canoeful of waterbending warriors to them.

But she can't turn her back on them. Though they are the enemy of her people, they're still humans, and they're desperate and harmless.

The sea is as merciful as it is brutal, and she sends them on their way peacefully with a swift current that will deposit them near the shore of a coastal Fire Nation colony.

For a while, she drifts just below the surface, keeping pace with them, scaring away curious sea serpents and coaxing schools of fish to drift just under them so Iroh can make sure they won't starve.

At some point, the prince awakens and peers down at the water below him, lost in thought.

She can't tell if he's seen her or not (Or even if she's visible to him at all), but he watches for a while nonetheless, as she stares back at him, wondering if in a different world, they could have been friends somehow.

Finally, when they're well out of Water Tribe territory, she allows the raft to slide ahead of her as she slips deeper into her element.

Yue is calling her, and they have much to do.

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When Master Pakku denies a crowd of girls who had witnessed his fight with Katara the right to learn to martial waterbending, he turns and strides away.

Immediately, he is slapped in the face by a water tentacle that appeared seemingly out of nowhere, and an ice disc whizzes by his face, close enough to slice off the ends of his mustache.

He pauses, then turns back and walks back to the group, who gape at the strange display of waterbending that seemed to appear out of nowhere.

To their utter amazement, he bows low before them and says that it would be his honor to teach them everything he knows.

When his decision is laughed at by the Chief's government and his students, he leads them into the spirit oasis with a wry grin.

That night, the spirits appear before them for the first time as mortals, and the forms they choose are those of the daughter of Chief Arnook and the girl who accompanied the Avatar.

They explain with voices cooler than polar nights that the moon and the ocean, and all the power they hold, are under new management. That the Tribes are going to start treating girls and women with the respect they've deserved all along and any objectors will find themselves at the bottom of the ocean.

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In the months that pass, the remains of the Southern Water Tribe's navy becomes a fighting force that the world has never seen before.

Those who survive the raids say that it's as if the ocean itself is on their side.

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When the sun is blackened by the moon and the invasion begins, the ocean surges far past the coast, and sweeps through the streets of the Caldera, hunting down anyone who would stand in the way of the Avatar as he races towards his destiny.

When the Firelord is nowhere to be found, she slips into the cracks of the stone and searches until she finds his hiding place, and Yue tells her that there isn't enough time to wait for Aang to find him, that she can't cover the sun for much longer.

That if they want this done now before any other lives are lost, they'll have to do it themselves.

When the Firelord is waiting for the eclipse to end in his bunker, and feels rage burn inside him as he listens to his son denounce him and announce that he's joining the Avatar, it's easy to ignore the minor discomfort of the feeling of something cold dripping onto his head from above. He doesn't expect the screeching as the stone and metal of the ceiling crumbles and tears and the weight of the sea drops onto him, smashing him to the floor, sucking the breath out of his lungs.

Somehow, though there's water in his lungs, he can still scream.

* * *

 **A/N:** The scene with Yue and Tui has always stayed with me (And it popped up when I read the prompt, since I thought of selflessness and immediately thought, _Yue_ ). At one point while rewatching _The Siege of the North_ , I wondered what would have happened if Zhao had killed the ocean too, either intentionally or by mistake. I mean, when he blasted the oasis, he could've gotten both of them.

A friend also talked to me about the first time she'd watched the episode, and she honestly thought that La was going to die as well, and that Katara was going to take his place. Although that sure as hell didn't happen, I always thought that would have been interesting to explore.

So yeah, this is an AU where Katara replaces La and becomes the ocean. It really strayed from the prompt, but I still like how it turned out.

Thanks for reading!


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